You want to know something stupid?

I’m procrastinating. I’m putting off editing The Right People for an editor who said he’d give it another look if I trimmed it. I’m hovering around 22K, and he wants 16K.

This could be tricky.

Granted, I’ve brought this beast down from 33K, which is a hell of a thing. A lot of it was fat, stuff that I put in because I was so in love with my freakin’ brilliance, man, which is shorthand for not knowing when to shut the hell up. Shutting the hell up means editors will ask for more; babbling away on paper means they don’t need to ask for more. Simple.

But I realize that the reason I’m putting this off is the same lame-ass excuse I’ve used many times before: if I don’t edit, I don’t have anything to send; and if I don’t have anything to send, I don’t have anything that can get rejected. This is weak talk, loser talk, and Ironmen don’t talk weak, even when they’re talking about writing. Ironmen show up, which is why I’m going to finish this damn thing and get it down to size and send it off to the mad Dutchman. Just watch.